HOW (SOME) POLY PEOPLE MEET EACH OTHER

Polyamory means "loving more than one". This love may be sexual, emotional, spiritual, or any combination thereof, according to the desires and agreements of the individuals involved. "Polyamorous" is also used as a descriptive term by people who are open to more than one relationship even if they are not currently involved in more than one.

This is a list of collected stories about how (some) poly people happened to meet each other.

This list was compiled after Jennie started the "how did you meet" thread on alt.polyamory with her brief but obviously powerful short post:

Stef: At a women's pagan ritual. On soc.singles. On the triples mailing list. On a local BDSM mailing list. On alt.polyamory. At a polyamory discussion group. At a fat women's support group.
Max: I met E in the hot tub at the local women's bath house. I started developing a friendship with her and her girlfriend S (whom I had met a few months earlier during a breakfast for a mutual friend visiting from out of town). E hinted that she was attracted to me in a post on a mailing list that we both subscribe to, and we began flirting via email. E & S and I discussed doing some s/m and sex play together. I realized I was attracted to E, but not to S. I called E and asked her out on a date. (Well, asked her over to my king-sized bed for a date, we didn't actually leave the bedroom for about 9 hours). I met R at an annual gathering for s/m type folks. She had written an article in a book I'd read, and I had sent her email to tell her about a zine I was publishing on a related topic. At the fair I was handing out flyers for said zine, and I gave one to her, at which point she introduced herself, and she and her girlfriend and I started becoming friends. About a year and a half later, I left the collective that was producing the zine, and R joined it. Around that time we started confessing our attraction for one another, and became lovers
Angi: At my first BDSM event, a rope flogger making workshop (sort of "kinky summer camp craft night") which he was presenting. He told me my knots were backwards, and otherwise hardly noticed me. Ahead of time, I'd been warned, "you'll flip over him. Everyone does." A few months later, we exchanged hugs and a quick nibble after another event. Then, at a party, we wound up alone in the same room, talking. (I stark raving naked, as was my habit at parties.) I went to move closer, to talk more easily, and moved all the way into his arms. The rest, as they say... He's worn the key to my collar, and I his symbol branded into my thigh, for two years now. Happy anniversary, my love!
Bearpaw: I met my current primary at a Chiltern Mountain Club event. (Chiltern is "one of the world's largest Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual outdoor sports organizations", and is based in the New England area of the US.) I went to the event with one of my, uh, hmm, "occasional sweeties"? (Well, he's always a sweetie :-> but we're only occasionally sexual.) I've met other people through friends, and through the local "bi community".
Steve: Actually, I have met two partners right here on alt.polyamory. Which certainly makes me feel very fortunate that this newsgroup exists and has the qualities that it does. If my experiences are typical, those who participate here are not only wonderfully romantically inclined, but possess a strong preference for being honest and open in matters of love. There are not many places where people with such qualities can be found other than by pure chance. But to answer the question more completely, I think I'll have to use a narrow definition of "partner" to include only those whom I will be spending time with now or in the very near future; of these, one I met while in college way back when; one I met on IRC; and one is among the two mentioned above whom I met here.
I met my hubby Bruce through a personal ad, I met Janine, my lover, at a support group.
In 1984, L and I were hanging around in occasionally overlapping pans of the LA pagan community. I was married, he was usually with someone, and the concept of poly was pretty unknown to me. I did think he was kinda cute, and we flirted a little when we happened to run into each other over the next few years (which was not often)... In 1988, I had moved to the Bay Area. My roommate at the time went to Baycon memorial day weekend, while I was off visiting my husband in LA. When I got back, she mentioned that she had met this nice Pagan guy from LA .... It was L. They dated for a while, so I saw him occasionally when he was there to see her. 1992 in the warm pool at Harbin during Ancient Ways, I looked over and saw L. We connected a little there, and a little later he came up behind me and gave me a hug that utterly melted me... It's like he was a strand weaving in and out of my life until the time was right.
I first met Elaine when I was running an Sf bookshop and she was one of my customers, but we were both monogamous and married at the time. We didn't meet again until many years (and several relationships) later, at a folk music and poetry-reading group, and I asked her out. She found out, through mutual friends, that I was single, and then came back to the bookshop and trapped me behind the counter until she ascertained that I meant it. Elaine met Laurton at a photo-shoot for Gay Pride Week, stopped just short of having sex on the table, and made a date to meet again later. Most of our casual lovers have been co-eds of Elaine's, or women we've met at sf conventions (I seem to be reading that one a lot on this thread...)
Sybel: My relationships are very strange, in that they grew from some remarkable coincidences. It all started some 20 years ago. I was stationed with the active duty Marine Corps, newly married and was now heading for my first assignment - Okinawa, Japan. My new, and physically abusive husband was also stationed on Okinawa. I was scared, pregnant, rather well beat up, headed to a totally new job and country, and icing a 15 hour flight with a single lay-over in Alaska. I did what I always do, grabbed a large book (The Star-Child Trilogy) and a cup of coffee and sat to wait the few hours for my flight to take off, then read myself to sleep on the plane. Except that it didn't really go that way. Another Marine came and plopped himself down beside me and either ignored the book, or tried to get me to put it down and talk to him. We ended up swapping seats and sitting together for the flight. I fell asleep on him - literally. For his part, he just snuggled in and held on. We became friends for most of the year that I was there. I was shipped out of the Corps. He went to his next duty station, I got divorced, and we never saw each other again.

Skip to three years ago. I'm talking with my current husband about cutting grass and getting divorced, and to change the topic away from the fighting (the kids were in the next room), my husband asks me about someone in the Marine Corps. Wouldn't you know it was the person I fell asleep on 15 years before? We exchanged a few letters, then I drove down to see him again. Everything we had as friends had magnified. His wife and I got along too well (almost like sisters), and next thing you know, we all buy a house together and move in. know the story, but I'm still not sure how it all happened. It just did.

For someone who wants to meet like-minded people, I have only a few words of advice. Be yourself. Be honest with everyone you meet. You never know who you will end up seeing again. Or what will happen when you do.

Carol: I met both of my partners at the Loving More conference (then known as Pepcon) in September 1992 at Harbin Hot Springs. Howard and I met in a nonverbal interpersonal exercise that opened up the conference, then met again in the warm pool, with my husband at the time. I was interested in Howard from the beginning -- physically we connected well at the exercise, then in talking he seemed interested in similar things to me, then the following night he gave me a watsu (water massage) and I totally fell in love. At one point in the first evening, Gelly came floating up to us, as we talked. She was at one with the water and herself. That was my first glimpse of her, and it stayed with me, though it took longer for the promise of that time to come true. By the end of the weekend, I was deeply in love with Howard, and the long process of poly family formation and individual transformation and growth had begun. Gelly and I took almost 3 years to fully connect with each other (the final breakthrough was at Harbin, in the warm pool again), and my former partner and myself took about that long to fully disconnect. Almost 4 years later, Howard, Gelly and I are a triad, living together with our 3 children.
N: My husband met my "to be" wife at a concert where she was performing 3 years ago, and hit it off right away. They had a serious case of the hots for each other. At the time we were monogamous, but we had been talking about needing *more*. We had been married about 8 years then, and my husband respected our monogamy, so he didn't pursue it any further. They ran into each other from time to time at various pagan events, but never found the time or place to "get together", (we had definitively decided to *open* our marriage by this time). At one fateful gig R (hubby of record) and B (my wife, now) set up a time for her and her husband to come visit. I, at this point, had still never met B or her husband, although I had seen B in concert, and thought she was beautiful. I had not been with anyone else sexually, at this point and needless to say, I was NERVOUS. But, within 2 hours of meeting them we were all nekkid in front of the fire. The sex was great but I was still uncomfortable with the idea (my husband would say I was insane with guilt). But even with having some problems dealing with the whole poly-sex thing, I fell in love with B (wife) and B (my husband not of record but of heart), and with the passage of time and very understanding partners I got thru it and now I am hartfasted to 3 wonderful people.
I met B at a bi convention in um... 1992 maybe. We first had sex that weekend, and the first sex party I ever attended, and have been dating ever since.

I met S at a soc.bi gathering at Stonewall 25 in NYC (1994). Didn't like him, he was grumpy to me. I met him again, a month later, at another soc.bi party in NYC. He was standing behind a friend of mine giving her hugs & making her purr, and I was hugging her from the front. My eyes met his. We smiled. It was electric. We then flirted on soc.bi a little, started exchanging more and more and more and more e-mail, saw each other again at a party in October, made out in the back yard a bit, got together a month later just the two of us, and have been dating ever since. We started out thinking we would be friends who had sex... but fell in love. *sappy romantic smile*

I met P at the same soc.bi party that my eyes met S's. She and I were sitting next to each other, but hadn't been formally introduced. Someone called me by my name, she turned to me and squealed "You're Cappy?!?! I have to give you a hug!" I said "Why?" And she said "Because... because you're CAPPY!" And she gave me a most enthusastic hug. (She knew me from my posts on soc.bi.) Oh, B showed up at that party too. *grin*

I met D at our area's monthly BDSM dinners. Again, it was a case of our eyes meeting, long lingering looks, a long hug goodbye one night after dinner, me murmuring something half-joking about my jealous boyfriend, him backing off, me getting out of that relationship with the jealous boyfriend, me seeing him again, and me somehow clearly signalling my availability. That was over a year ago as well. We just recently (as in, last week) told each other that we loved each other. We had been "casually dating" before that seeing each other every other week or so, but I don't think we're anticipating much of a change in our relationship, except hopefully more acknowledgement of our feelings for each other. There are other people in my life, friends I have sex with sometimes, friends who live across the country, friends whom I've been flirting with... but those are the three major sweeties in my life right now. :)

Skye: I met the man who is now my husband (M) when I first got to college at an informal Shabbat held by a mutual friend. I started hitting on him immediately; he essentially giggled, blushed and ignored it. As we got to be friends, we constantly talked about how we should get married regardless of whether or not we ever had a romantic relationship because we had such similar views on just about everything important: home, family, poly, etc. I started dating another man, M started dating another woman, his girlfriend didn't want to be poly, my boyfriend didn't want to either, I fell for her, they broke up, we broke up. I got together with M as my first relationship was disintegrating for a "physical" relationship and we "accidentally" fell in love and got married.

Then his ex and I dated while she was seeing two men as well, then she and I broke up (all while M and she and I were roommates), which was really for the best (not because of roommateness.) In the interests of circularity, I *really* think M's/my ex-girlfriend and my ex-boyfriend should get together except for the fact that they'd both hate it.

So essentially, college has so far been my only resource for meeting partners; in a hippie liberal arts college, a lifestyle like polyamory spreads well enough so that everyone at least knows about it and sorts themselves fairly well. Makes the investigatory stage of a relationship somewhat easier when people already have vocabulary for it.

Pamela: I met David in college, though we didn't get involved until a while after we had both graduated; I met Elise in the Minnesota Science Fiction Society, though we didn't get involved until about ten years after we met; and I met Raphael on Fidonet, on the SF and Writing Echoes: we switched to internet email fairly soon, which sped up the process of getting to know one another considerably, and got involved about eighteen months after we started exchanging email messages, before we had actually met. Think there's a pattern there?
I met one in a basement and another in a laboratory ;- I'll emphasize the mundane a little. Just as I don't think one will be very successful *looking* for partners, I don't think one will be especially successful *looking* for poly partners. It really can "just happen", especially if your taste in friends runs to interesting and open minded.

I met P while we were both still in high school. A friend had enticed me to come along to "E's house" on the basis that her mother stocked the fridge really well (an extremely important consideration for under-financed teenage boys ;-) ). The fridge lived up to expectations. E turned out to be a precocious and bitchy 14 yr old . She also had a much quieter and more interesting older sister, P, who was watching the entire scene while filling in the colours of one of those doodleart posters that were popular in the early seventies. I helped add in a few colours, chatted a bit, and wondered how we might get better acquainted. A friend of mine (faster on his feet, but less patient and persistent) asked her out first, and I was so mystified by mono (let alone poly) dynamics that I figured that was that. When they seemed to be ignoring each other I (dumb as an ox) asked *him* what was going on and luckily got a relatively accurate (although unflatteing) answer. It wasn't until much later that I was dumped on for holding back so long. ;-)

We've been together ever since, except for a two year hiatus spent convincing ourselves that it was the fight thing. About 10 years later and "great with child", P came to join a group from the lab who had got together at the end of the day. She and L met and became great friends. I thought this was wonderful, since there were not that many people who fit well with both of us then, yet any two out of three could sit together and talk for hours and the three of us could go on indefinitely. We still weren't ready for the idea of poly, so we hung out together and kept those occasional dangerous thoughts to ourselves.

J arrived on the scene. L finished and went off to Ottawa. M arrived on the scene. I finished and the four of us went off to Germany. L went off to Ohio. We worked hard and lost touch. then found each other again a few years ago. This time we were ready for the idea, and it only took us a year to get around to it. (remember, I said "patient and persistent")

J will be 12 this fall. M will be 9 this week. Almost twenty-two years on, the adventure is still beginning .

Tolovana: First of all, let me say that I've never 'dated' anyone. All my partners have started out as friends. Some were friends for quite a long time before they became partners/lovers/sweeties. I met my first poly partner in school. My husband and I met at the library - we both worked there. I applied for the job *because* he worked there, a girlfriend had scoped him out for me. However, it wasn't until after I quit working there that we became close. I met my hubbie when I became a co-sysop/programmer on a local BBS that he co-owned. I met another sweetie on a usenet news group - we're not sure which one. (ASB is what she thinks, I think it was alt.poly.) Two more I aquired from a poly-email list and subsequent 'cracker munches'. (Cracker munches are coffee-tea-chats at a local espresso shop.)
Sean: My current lover (the only one I have at the moment) and I were introduced nearly 5 years ago by a mutual friend. Soon after that, she started dating this friend, much to my chagrin as I had become smitten. At that time, I hadn't thought all that much about polyamory, and I assumed (incorrectly) that their relationship was monogamous. I thought I wouldn't have a chance with her. A few months later I moved to another state for 6 months. When I returned, almost 4 years ago, I found out they had broken up. I ran into her soon after that, we started hanging out, and then one night acknowledged our mutual feelings toward each other. Thus began the relationship. She informed me right before we started going out, or perhaps right after, that she refused to be monogamous in relationships, and I thought that was just dandy. The rest, as they say, is herstory.
Cya, Rob: Well, I didn't think I'd have anything different to tell, but happily I do. We (the three of us) were high school sweethearts... sort of. We went to school with each other for six years, always keeping very close, but never getting "involved" one way or another with each other. In fact, looking back, at high school we were always closer to each other than to the various partners we each had at the time. Hehe, and I know it was a source of much concern for one or two of those partners.

Things changed a little when I started going out with a mutual friend of the three of us. (Besides each other, this girl was the closest friend *all three* of us had.) We knocked about with each other as a friendly social set for a couple of years until my then gf moved overseas. The day we said goodbye to her at the airport, the three of us shared something special just for a moment. Then we went our separate romantic ways, but remained close friends.

A year later, it's my birthday and also that of K. (We're twins to the day. :) We had the bash of bashes for a party, and at the end of the night K and I are together, and very happy about the fact that our mutual friend M has found the (other :) nicest bloke at the party. A happy three-year interlude followed with the two monogamous couples sharing a lot of social occasions, though for some reason the other "he" never seemed to get some of the in-jokes. Then, almost as if by mutual consent, we all reached some major turning points in our lives. Uni, friends, family, work, romantic plans and taken-for-granted assumptions about all sorts of things suddenly blew up and didn't come down.

We rode it out, and at the end by some set of coincidences that none of us can really piece together, the three of us were living together and loving it. There are so many stories in between that it's hard to point to where it happened. The weekend I spent in another state, after which I came home and found that both M and K had been seduced by another female friend was instrumental, as was the night that same female friend seduced me. Discovering this newsgroup at just the right moment helped, and so did moving house together, alcohol and playing soccer. :)

The thing I remember most is the day we lay in bed together just to talk. When K ran her hand up M's spine the way I'd told her she liked, I was surprised only at my lack of surprise. It just felt so *right*. It was that day that I suddenly understood that the term, "best friend" was neither singular nor limiting. A funny postscript to the story which many may appreciate is that a year later, when we told that old friend of ours from high-school, her first reaction was, "Yuck!" Then, "Explain it again in my language, please." Then, "Gee, maybe it's lucky I didn't hang around..." Then, "So why have I been through so many guys so quickly? Can I come back and visit?" And finally, "You know, you're the three best friends I ever had; I suppose it's just *right* that you worked out like that. Now I know that I chose the right friends." :) Well, that story ended up going on for a little longer than I intended... sorry... (a bit. :)

Samantha Star Straf : How I met my partners... I met my wife Holly because she was dating my boyfriend's roommate. I thought I had once again fallen for a straight woman, it took her a few tries of hitting me over the head with a baseball bat to convince me she wasn't.

Pooch was my game master back in college and we had been best friends for about about 10 years and finally started dating when we went to my ex-girlfriend's wedding. I figured it wouldn't work because of the polyamory thing (all his prior relationships were very monogamous) but he seems to be adjusting just fine.

So basically I met my wife by dating a guy, and my guy by dating a girl.

I tend to meet my secondaries at Science Fiction Conentions. Both Holly and Pooch are involved in fandom but that isn't how I met them.

One of my panners was a grad student in the same department I was in, and we had friends in common, and we were in a party skit together, and then he found out that my office had a cheaper coffee club, so then I found out that he was a really interesting guy who liked to talk. And then we were all on the patio of the Graduate Club one summer afternoon, celebrating someone's passing Generals, I think all my friends kept saying "P's coming to meet us! P's going to be here, isn't she?" and I wondered who she was .... I can still remember what she was wearing. She was great with child, and relaxed and happy, and I thought she was beautiful. And that was almost twelve years ago Thanks for asking!
It was thanks to the Taiwan police, in part.

A friend had met me in Taiwan (where I had been studying) to do some climbing for the summer. But when we went to climb Jade Mountain (Taiwan's highest peak, ca. 13,000 ft.), we were foiled by the local police. Even though she and I were both experienced mountaineers, they told us we needed to hire a local guide and have a party of four, etc. (All this, for a walk-up peak!) So she and I split early for Japan and spent a most enjoyable summer hitching around, climbing, and learning delighfully un-ladylike Japanese from truck drivers.

As Americans are wont to do, at one point we were grousing to some Japanese mountaineering buddies about the restrictiveness of the climbing regulations on Taiwan. Well, said one, as a matter of fact, our university alumni climbing club is planning an Expedition to Jade Mountain next winter. Please join us! (Now, a saunter up Jade mountain, even in its subtropical winter snows, does perhaps not merit the term "Expedition", but that's what they called it.) So, six months later, I joined them. Of the seven, there was one guy who bravely attempted to traverse our language gap several times. I found him earnest, ruggedly handsome, and endearingly goofy. BUT at that time I was most decidedly Not Into Men and Enjoying Being Single etc etc. Yet in the months that followed I found myself corresponding with greater and greater urgency with him, creating fake Japanese sentences by writing Chinese (which I know well) first, then moving the verb to the end, and then adding a Japanese past tense conjugation, and hoping that he'd be able to parse it. And so it went. (I should add that although Chinese and Japanese both use Chinese characters in writing, the two languages are completely unrelated and have quite different word orders.)

Anyway, from him, I got a lot of thinly-veiled allegorical letters about "burning bushes" and whatnot. So, we've been together for ten years, learned each other's languages, and spawned a not-so-small fry. For the past year I've been trying to talk him into something other than don't-ask-don't tell polyamory, without much success. But these things take time, ohh if I weren't so impatient ....

Dhanu River: I met S in Fremantle (WA) in 1981, at a meeting in which ze was putting foreword a scheme to start a dance/theatre project. Ze lived in Melbourne at the time. I liked the project, thought ze was a spunk, and when we first touched in saying goodbye after the talk, there was a lightnening-strike of some kind of energy through both our bodies. We just looked at each other wide-eyed. We became lovers about two days later, and the following year ze moved to Freo for the project, the Red Herring Dance/Theatre Company. Ze directed the dance side, and I directed the theatre side, and we moved in with each other, although we ended up living sometimes together, sometimes in different houses over the next few years.

We later were taken in different life directions, but have recently re-connected, and are together full-on again in a way I can only describe as "incandescent". Trips between Canberra and Sydney are expensive, but we see each other at least one weekend a fortnight.

S had lived with Jay earlier, and also lived with Jay during the periood we were together, and this was how I met Jay. We didn't get together for a couple of years, during a period when we were sharing a house. Jay and I were subsequently together for 11 years. We moved to Canberra together, though we don't live in the same house.

I met Raj in 1985 as someone with whom I was sharing a house. We got on wonderfully, and ended up sharing our next two houses. We became occasional lovers a couple of years later, and the relationship remains mainly emotional, with occasional physical components. Ze currently lives in Fremantle, so I don't get a chance to see zir often.

I have a few casual partners, most of whom I know through Sanyass, HAl, Pagan circles or the Canberra bisexual network and its activities.

I also have a beloved who I have not yet physically met. Ze lives in Wisconsin, and I plan to spend a fair bit of time with her in the coming N'mercan winter. We'll meet in SF, where we will also meet up with at least one of her othedoves, who bears a decided resemblance to Darth Vadar (6'3", big, and generally dressed in black leather). I'm currently making my independent connection with him, and we all intend to troop around as a triad while we're all three in Calif.

I met M through the net on conferences dealing with ecological and community development issues, and subsequently on a conference dealing with gender issues. We always liked each other's posts, and at~er a few years, we exchanged an ernail letter. Since then we generally both write about twice a week, and write about 15 pages in each letter. The relationship deepened, and we now call each other once a fortnight by phone.

Gary: Fellow science fiction fans, to slightly varying degrees. But in every case, it has been friends, friends of friends, and we've met at friendly get-togethers, small parties, or conventions. Sometimes it took years to get around to developing a romantic or sexual component, sometimes it was nearly immediate after meeting in person, but in those latter cases we had always been communicating in writing for months beforehand. I can get a crush nearly immediately, but I tend to need a fair amount of time before becoming comfortable with entering into a Serious Relationship. Of course, now I've learned a bit of the Deadly Art of Net.Flirting ;-)
Leigh: My first pp (read: poly-partner) I met at a Bisexual Group Social. We went to a bar and danced all night.

I first saw my second pp at a halloween bonfire where a friend of mine wanted to introduce me to this person they had a crush on so as to get my opinion of the person. The next halloween, after being pursued by my friend for a year, my second pp kissed my on the couch. The rest...

My 3rd pp was the lover of my 1st pp. I don't know how they met, but I think it was at a sweat-lodge. My 4th pp my 1st pp met at a SF convention. Iwas aked by my 1st pp to go have coffee with my 4th pp and tell my 1st pp what I thought of my 4th pp. We talked all night and I ended up living with my 4th pp.

My 5th (current) pp I met at a toy store. :)

M: I met my 1st & so far only poly partner on the net, (IRC undernet chat) about 6 too. ago. I recently met him f2f at his wedding in Texas where I was a female "best man" for him. He & his wife have aked me to become their co-wife & (allowing for certain other stiuations in my life), I have agreed to join them. Such a unique & loving world.
I met my longest-term lover "K", now my wife at college. We were each others' first loves and first sexual partners. Recognizing the silliness of trying to stay together forever with no outside sexual experience, we agreed to allow each other an "affair". This single permission has since turned into fairly straightforward "polyamory".

A few years later, I met my second-longest-term lover, "E". She knew K from childhood and always wanted her. My initial intent was simply to have a friend in the new city we'd moved to. Before too long, we were living in a big house, friends. I can still remember how amazingly difficult it was for me to force the words out of my rebellious mouth. "Urn, uh, I was wondering..." But, I did force out the question and she was interested. It didn't work completely work out, we ended up moving to separate houses in another year or so, but we remained friends and occasional lovers. In the last few years, we have gotten together sexually. ..maybe four times.

Three years ago, I had a brief intense relationship with a woman from work, 'L" . L was not at all comfortable with my marriage to K. She refused to meet K for months. Her desire for social permissability/marriage ended that relationship after about six months. This caused me to decide that for the near term, I will only date people in the occult community, since they are a good deal more accepting of alternatives.

All my encounters since then have been within the occult orders. The most significant of them is a woman, 'A" I met the spring before last while visiting some occult buddies in another state. She is a lover of another friend of mine in the order. I admired her beauty and fire from a distance, so made some wooing-gift-jeweiry (labia rings) before the next time I visited. The jewelry ended up not being needed as an ice-breaker, since the chemistry between us was quite strong the second time we met. I am now on a twice yearly visit schedule with her, the most recent being a wonderful trip along highway 1 on the coast of California. Long distance love is interesting. Head-over-heels ... re-center ... head-over-heels ... re-center ...

A local BBS had a writer's conference that I started posting to. Some people on the conference regularily got together for coffees and it turned out that one of the other posters was someone I knew from University and another was a member of the local pagan community and knew my teachers and my (then) lover. So we became friends. My current SO was somebody I really enjoyed on-line because of zir's smarts and sense of humour. Zie finally showed up at one of our coffee-meets. By the time the group went our seperate ways I was head-over-heels.
Robbin: B's not stupid, so he invited the two smartest, strangest, people he knew to be his 10th grade biology lab partners. B and I hit it off, lots of unspoken eye contact communication between two closeted bi poly veggie pervert sex radicals going crazy in suburbia. It took me a year to come out of my shell enough to ask her out, by which time she was dating C, who was someone I knew and liked, straight but gentle funny nice etc. B & I had read heinlein together so we had some mutual understanding of what we were doing, and I was too out of it to realize how oddly the high school was looking at us, as C & I would walt for B each morning at her locker.

It lasted less than a year (the breakup being very traumatic for me), but we stayed in touch, due in part to my willingness to hitchhike anywhere to see her. She had an affair w/my best friend/roommate, taught me what safewords are, introduced me to L, a member of her lesbian-separatist no-boys-allowed household under the fiatirons. L and I lived together (mono) for 7 years till she left me for some guy. L now lives alone w four cats a house in the country and her own business.

Since then I've mostly had one night stands with guys met on irc* (one of the best at stonewall where cappy met s.) (*gtbear here). I'm still looking for that coop/bi/poly/radical household situation, not finding it here in mundaniapolis. No local bi support group like there was in Columbia, and the poly group here is great but kind of odd - they are grown-ups, where I feel more connected to the genX/slacker set. I'm pretty much of a hermit again, except for the net and my usual table at the coffehouse.

Noel: I met my first husband while working in a Hallmark store. He had just started college and was with a friend who wanted to find an obnoxious card for his girlfriend. We got to talking and I mentioned that I was a Heinlein fan. He said that the was too and we got to talking. I was dating someone else at the time -- someone who/said/it was okay with him that I was poly. (At the time, I had not heard of the term polyamory and just used the phrase "not monogamous"). It turned out that my boyfriend was most certainly/not/okay with my poly tendencies, so I went to my new friend to cry on him a bit. One thing led to another and we started dating pretty seriously after a few weeks.

We married two years later. At that time I had had two other realtionships (concurrent), but they were not serious.

Six years later, I met my present -- I guess you could say, "fiance"-- on the IRC (#polyamory or #heinlein, I don't remember which). He was someone with whom I had locked horns on alt.fan.heinlein, so I swiftly left the channel. I talk on IRC for fun only -- not heated debating. He/msged me and demanded why I left so quickly. We got to talking and we found that we had some amazingly similar interests. That was all she wrote. We'll be moving in together soon, I hope.

Troy: First polypartner and spouse-of-record: A and I met via a BBS in Los Angeles and an SCA-type war group in Thousand Oaks in 90...were friends for about 5 months, planned a group excursion to SF with her and her boyfriend-at-that-time, then wound up at her place when their relationship broke up two days before the scheduled departure. Spent a wonderful week with her and was handfasted to her 13 months later at Beltaine. And it has been a wonderful 5 and almost 6 years.

Second polypartner: (here's where it gets complex, people) J and I had known each other for about a year and a half, when she was involved with another good friend of ours. At the time we found each other again, she had been out of that relationship for a year, and was unattached. We cuddled at a Celtic music concert locally in April of 96, and I had had some ideas of seduction, but nothing more than just thinking about it.

After this, A and I were at an SCA event in May 96 and were having a good time with everyone...drinking, laughing, that sort of thing. She developed an interest in another gentleman, R, there (which I frankly encouraged, being open to her having another partner). Their relationship developed reasonably well. Then, she was called out of town on a family emergency. I had to stay due to work requirements. While she was out of town, R and I got together to go out to coffee with some of our friends...and I called up J and invited her to join us. Surprisingly, J & R hit it off really well. ..and after dropping R off at his place, I took J to her place. ..where I was invited up to spend the night (and pleasantly so, I might add). The next day, R and J and I went to dinner together and we all wound up back at my place, where R & J played while I crashed (had had one hour of sleep the prior night). ..and when A came home, R and I picked her up from the airport with the news that R & J had a relationship developing. ..but still wanted to develop the relationship between all four of us as well. We are now 7 months poly and living together...absolutely blissful.

Third polypartner: M was introduced to us by R in December 95 at a Yule party thrown by a local occult bookstore whose owners were close friends of A and myself. M & R were dating at the time. We met again in May 96 at an SCA event, where M and I cuddled for a lengthy period of time (M & R were no longer dating). M had to return to school shortly after that for graduation, but reappeared on our doorstep in August 96 saying she was "looking for trouble"...and she found me and hasn't yet wished to leave. M is closer to A and myself than she is to J & R, but enjoys spending time with all four of us and the two children that A and I have.

 
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